More people you meet in unexpected places …
The first time is Sunday at Symposium, which is really a nice restaurant that calls itself a café, just off the mayhem of 53rd in Davenport. Johnny Ciao is jumping around like a grasshopper with a silver tray, offering diners one of his creations that I couldn’t pronounce, but it is good – crisp strips of endive leaves filled with a puree of strawberry and raspberry sauce, gorgonzola cheese and bits of pecans.
Johnny has thick black rimmed glasses and he reminds me of Buddy Holly. He is something of a mystery man who hands over a card that reads, “Taste the sounds of the culinary rocker.” That intrigues, because he banters that he mixes music with food and once was a chef for Michael Jackson and Marlon Brando.
“What are you doing here? Where are you from?” I ask.
“I’m culinary chef for this year’s John Deere Classic and I’m from San Francisco.”
“San Fran? Then you must have read Herb Caen.”
Johnny is shocked. “Herb is my hero. He’s written columns about me. He was the soul of the city. You knew him?”
I tell of our casual acquaintance, calls and notes. It is an immediate bond. “If you knew Herb, you are my forever friend,” he exclaims. He keeps pumping my hand. “I’ll call you.”
The phone rings at midweek. “This is Johnny. I’ll see you at my blues buffet tonight, the John Deere Classic thing. It’s all my food.” I discover that Johnny is an international figure, author of cookbooks, one that sold 750,000 copies, and is a classic blues musician.
A memorable soiree unfolds at the Quad-Cities Waterfront Convention Center in Bettendorf. The food is the most scrumptious remembered … gourmet dishes with musical names like pop salad, which was one of Brando’s favorites; and Willie Nelson’s Texas stew with shrimp and fresh herbs; and chicken scallopini with an oatmeal citrus batter.
Johnny hops from table to table, joining us to tell about his time when he was a chef for Michael Jackson at Neverland Ranch. “He loved my Peter Pan pizza.” He regales with tales of how Brando once drove to Neverland in his pajamas.
Up comes a beautiful woman who could be a movie star. She asks, “May I join you and your wife?”
Rhonda Brooks of Bettendorf tells how she was dining at Symposium the same night we were munching on Johnny’s endive.
“I was outside, leaving, when this man (Johnny) runs to me and says, ‘Hey, I want to know you.’ I was shocked. He asked me to be his dinner guest while in the Quad-Cities. I didn’t know him, but said I would – all on the up-and-up. I would drive my own car wherever we were to meet, and then drive myself back home. We’ve been on river cruises and to dinners. Exciting.”
It is easy to be charmed by Rhonda, who works in the office of a Quad-City physician. Every now and then, Johnny leaves her side to play harmonica with the big-time James Montgomery Blues Band, the evening entertainment.
This is a classy $100-a-head party for the pro golfers, friends and Quad-City swells in general. Decker Ploehn is on stage, emceeing and running an auction of golf goodies.
It is one of those events where everyone is smiling. Men are talking par and women are brushing kisses on the cheeks of friends. Casual kissing is big these days.
We leave at 10 to find the battery dead on my little PT Cruiser. I’d dumbly left the lights on.
“I’ve got jumper cables. I’ll get you going,” offers Decker, Bettendorf’s city administrator, who leaves the party, rolls up his sleeves, and gets me started.
“Now, go straight home, Billy Boy,” he warns.